Wow. So, I came here to post about some studies, from the same people who did the original ones, are now revising the deadliness of the disease drastically downwards, and apparently, this makes me a terrible person.

How is the idea that there were a lot more asymptomatic infections than we knew, and thus the virus is a lot less deadly than we thought, bad news exactly? How does pointing out that the same experts are now revising their death estimates downward make me terrible exactly?

And why are so many of you so emotionally invested in this being as terrible as possible?

Steve, in general people could be sensitive to any information that tries to downplay the severity or danger of this virus. One very vocal idiot does it daily on television and seems to be setting the stage to start blaming others for his inadequate response. I donít think people are emotionally invested in this being as horrible as possible, but rather emotionally invested and opposed to anyone suggesting it wonít be as bad as we think.

I think it is going to be very bad and hope Iím wrong, but when bloggers change their tune after getting the virus, people die from it after calling it ďmass hysteriaĒ and sad stories of underestimating its severity leading to inadequate response, people are on edge.

If itís true that the novel coronavirus would kill millions without shelter-in-place orders and quarantines, then the extraordinary measures being carried out in cities and states around the country are surely justified. But thereís little evidence to confirm that premiseóand projections of the death toll could plausibly be orders of magnitude too high. [...] This does not make Covid-19 a nonissue. The daily reports from Italy and across the U.S. show real struggles and overwhelmed health systems. But a 20,000- or 40,000-death epidemic is a far less severe problem than one that kills two million. Given the enormous consequences of decisions around Covid-19 response, getting clear data to guide decisions now is critical.

You know how in many Sci-Fi movies humanity responds to the aftermath of an attack by a malevolent alien species by banding together to change they way we treat each other so we as a society can seek mutual betterment?

COVID 19 is that alien. And if this ends with our society even slightly resembling what it was before it arrived....we better learn how to operate our lives differently. Specifically we better figure out that our society is only as safe and secure as the least protected person among us.

Because people, egged on by the media & politicians, are descending into panic mode and fear a collapsing of society (anarchy, looting, riots, etc). This follows with a fear that law enforcement will be stretched too thin to protect people and a need to arm up to protect themselves

I'm not saying it's right or justified. I'm saying it's the cause-and-effect of creating a climate of fear and panic

Regarding the WSJ article: without a doubt the number of true infections is much larger than the number of positively identified cases. Most countries do not have anywhere near capacity to test at the moment.

I think the WSJ is making wild assumptions though about the number of infected in the US. The pattern of serious/critical cases shows hotspots in certain specific areas (most notably, New York). I don't think this is consistent with 6 million infections by 9 March. The rate at which this proliferates is possibly doubling the number of infections every two to three days -- which means it would have have peaked in terms of infections already. The pattern of serious cases suggests the viirus is still working its way inwards from those coastal hotspots.

Even better contrary evidence is in the form of the Diamond Princess. It had 3711 passengers. More than 3000 tests were performed. 712 tested positive. So far 10 have died. That is a mortality rate of 1.4%. This seriously undermines the WSJ's suggestion that the mortality rate is a fraction of a percent.

Peter, the WSJ article says exactly what I've been saying as have a number of other scientists.

Your Diamond Princess example doesn't apply. Its a cruise ship, not a scientific sample of the general population. What is the average age of a cruise ship passenger, do you imagine? Higher or lower than the national average in the US? I'd bet a fair degree higher. And that's just one way where the sample differs from the general population.

And if, among a group of older and therefore more at risk people, the death rate is only 1.4%, then how is it unbelievable that among the general population with a lower average age it might be half that or less?

We all trusted the scientists on their original estimates from the data, and anyone who doubted them was rightly informed that they don't have the credentials to disagree with the experts. Now that the experts are revising those estimates, why do so many people insist on disbelieving them?

I can pretty much tell you why. Because the media has everyone terrified. They got everyone to comply with lockdown (which was important for at least 2 weeks) by telling them that if they didn't they'd murder grandma. They got everyone to invest emotionally. So now that they're trying to unemotionally communicate a new set of facts, no one wants to risk murdering grandma if the new estimates turn out to be incorrect.